Taos, New Mexico
We had been looking forward for some time to our trip to Taos. We took the “high road” through the hills up to Taos, which was a longer but more scenic drive than the straight highway between Santa Fe and Taos. When we arrived at Taos, we were surprised to find that it was not thronging with tourists. As with Santa Fe, the historical downtown Taos area centers around small plaza ringed by historical buildings. In many ways, it seemed like a smaller version of Santa Fe’s plaza. We found a nice restaurant nearby for lunch and Jo had a good time wandering around several of the nearby shops while David sat outside watching the small number of tourists wander around. After lunch, we walked around the neighborhood surrounding the plaza, but there were only a small number of older buildings before the neighborhood changed over to new construction. While pleasant, we were surprised that it didn’t capture our interest for a sustained period, and we left the historic downtown area only a few hours after lunch.
We were very pleasantly surprised when we thereafter went out to the nearby Taos Pueblo for a visit. Unlike the Zuni Pueblo we had visited the week before, Taos Pueblo gave us very much of a feeling for what the buildings would have been like when the pueblo was originally constructed more than 100 years ago. While some of the dwellings have been converted to shops, many are still used as dwellings. And while there are now doors and windows at the ground level, and the old doorways through the roofs have been converted into skylights, they still limit the use of modern conveniences in the pueblo and none of the pueblo buildings have electricity. This was our best experience to date in gaining a flavor for Indian life before being heavily influenced by European immigrants. The Pueblo alone was enough to make the trip to Taos worthwhile, and we were glad we had come. The trip to Taos was a fine conclusion to a very enjoyable week in the Santa Fe area.
We had been looking forward for some time to our trip to Taos. We took the “high road” through the hills up to Taos, which was a longer but more scenic drive than the straight highway between Santa Fe and Taos. When we arrived at Taos, we were surprised to find that it was not thronging with tourists. As with Santa Fe, the historical downtown Taos area centers around small plaza ringed by historical buildings. In many ways, it seemed like a smaller version of Santa Fe’s plaza. We found a nice restaurant nearby for lunch and Jo had a good time wandering around several of the nearby shops while David sat outside watching the small number of tourists wander around. After lunch, we walked around the neighborhood surrounding the plaza, but there were only a small number of older buildings before the neighborhood changed over to new construction. While pleasant, we were surprised that it didn’t capture our interest for a sustained period, and we left the historic downtown area only a few hours after lunch. 
We were very pleasantly surprised when we thereafter went out to the nearby Taos Pueblo for a visit. Unlike the Zuni Pueblo we had visited the week before, Taos Pueblo gave us very much of a feeling for what the buildings would have been like when the pueblo was originally constructed more than 100 years ago. While some of the dwellings have been converted to shops, many are still used as dwellings. And while there are now doors and windows at the ground level, and the old doorways through the roofs have been converted into skylights, they still limit the use of modern conveniences in the pueblo and none of the pueblo buildings have electricity. This was our best experience to date in gaining a flavor for Indian life before being heavily influenced by European immigrants. The Pueblo alone was enough to make the trip to Taos worthwhile, and we were glad we had come. The trip to Taos was a fine conclusion to a very enjoyable week in the Santa Fe area.
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